By Elliott West
“You can’t teach confidence -it just comes from winning”.
Mark Selby
Introduction
In order to see a professional snooker player up close and weaving their craft, it is imperative that you take the opportunity to attend an exhibition, an event that gives fans the opportunity to have a frame against them and a few words when the opportunity arises. So it was fitting that Mark Selby chose to showcase his expertise at a London snooker club, the Hurricane Room which is situated in the very heart of King’s Cross. A club run by the diligent and hard-working manager, Sean McCollum. A snooker club that has a wealth of history with Steve Davis, Alex Higgins, Patsy Fagan and Doug Mountjoy having appeared here when it was the King’s Cross Snooker Club and Mark Allen recently. A building that is situated above the deep tunnels of the Northern Line.
The Click of Class
Mark Selby wears his Triple Crown badge with pride and rightly so. A four-time world champion, he has an impressive work CV with nine Triple Crown titles and 22 ranking titles. A player who learned his craft under the wing of the much-missed Malcolm Thorne, brother of the late Willie Thorne at the family-run Willie Thorne Snooker Centre in Leicester. Emerging from behind a velvet curtain alongside the rising star of the walk-on world, Alisha Lancaster who Mark has nicknamed ‘Bomber’ after the famous World War Two plane, The Jester received rapturous applause, aided by the dulcet tones on the microphone of the gifted Master of Ceremonies, Colin Phillips and accompanied by the much sought after the referee, Richard Barnicoat, who can’t even now walk down his local Tesco aisles without being recognised.
Mark shone in this exhibition, displaying his catalogue of breathtaking shots and pots, keeping his amateur opponents firmly glued to their chair. His sheer knowledge of angles is next to none, being able to pot a ball off of multiple cushions and he has even perfected the one-handed Mark Williams’ cue shot where the cue is launched in dart-like fashion to pot a ball with ultimate ease. Yet the Jester from Leicester showed a great deal of generosity to his opponents, never letting himself steal the show completely. He was always mindful to praise good shots and pots and repositioned a ball when he missed, allowing his opponent to pot it.
A gleeful Selby was smiling like a Cheshire cat when he beat Mark Allen’s exhibition record of three centuries at this club and made four with the highest break of 138. An achievement that he momentarily revealed, joking to Colin Phillips that he should get Mark Allen on the phone. In the end, Mark only lost one frame to Lee Whaley in the last raffled frame. This is out of a total of 11 frames played on the night. We also got to see another side of Mark, a Selby at ease with a pint and joking with the audience, happy to spend time autographing snooker balls, cue cases and photographs for his adoring fans A pure snooker treat and a Saturday evening that all those who attended have left with fond memories. I am reliably told that it was so good that some stayed until the wee hours of the morning and didn’t leave until 5 am.
